When we heard the chatter over a never-titled 10th Anniversary Trans Am with 6.7 miles, we immediately suspected it might be a car that had stayed with the dealership that received it when new. Turns out, that’s just what happened to this ’79 T/A, according to the preview information for the Beckort Auctions sale of property from the now defunct Kitterman Motors in Corydon, Indiana, which states that most of this Trans Am’s life was spent in the showroom.
The 10th Anniversary Trans Am does tend to be the type of car that turns up with relatively low miles with fair frequency, mostly because a lot of enthusiasts recognized that they were special from day one. Still, it’s not often that any car can claim to have disturbed so few of its odometer digits; the same goes for never having been titled.
In this case, it appears that the sale is the result of Kitterman Motors’ closure, after 80 years of family ownership. Though we hate to hear stories like that, some collector stands to benefit from the opportunity to procure what is being billed as an essentially new ’79 Trans Am. And if you’re into documentation, this car comes with lots of items you won’t normally see – things like the manufacturer’s invoice, the trucking company manifest, the computer punch card from GM, promotional items and what appears to be every card and tag that would have been fastened to a brand-new ’79 Trans Am. That includes the window stickers still stuck to the glass – two of them, thanks to the lengthy equipment list. There’s also a special dealer order form for this limited-run model, clearly showing the “X” where the Kitterman rep checked off the W72 400/four-barrel engine, bringing with it the mandatory four-speed manual transmission. As such, it’s one of 1,817 made.
Though the plastic is still on the seats and steering wheel and the original Uniroyals look factory fresh, close scrutiny of the images does show some dirt on the driver’s interior armrest, and the plastic chrome escutcheon around the interior door release lever is deteriorated a bit; there’s also evidence of dirt in the gutters around the trunk hinges, so the car isn’t absolutely pristine. But a first-hand inspection would probably make the car’s condition quite clear to prospective buyers. This could prove to be a great score for some collector.
The auction takes place July 2 in Corydon.
